


Five Birthdays

by Minnow_53



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Marauders Era (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:27:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25483156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minnow_53/pseuds/Minnow_53
Summary: A year of Marauder birthdays.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Kudos: 13





	Five Birthdays

**Author's Note:**

> First published on LiveJournal 10/8/05. Thanks to Asterie for the beta.  
> This was a birthday fic for an LJ friend.

**1\. Remus**

Remus’s birthdays tend to be either brilliant or terrible.

On his sixth birthday, he was struggling for his life after a werewolf bite inflicted three days earlier. On his tenth, he fell off his new trampoline and broke both front teeth: they had to be fixed with very painful magic.

Conversely, on his eleventh birthday, he had an owl from Professor Dumbledore, Head of Hogwarts, to let him know that the governors had agreed to put him on the list of students starting in September. And on his thirteenth, he was introduced to the delights of turning a year older in the company of those pranksters extraordinaire, Sirius Black and James Potter. He spent a delirious day watching Severus Snape turn fluorescent green at a whispered command from James, eating birthday cake Transfigured from a rusty nail, and imbibing a wonderful, probably illegal, potion that made him giggle uncontrollably from lunchtime to teatime. Later, he was treated to a party that included his first taste of Firewhisky (watered down) and his first taste of girls – Zoe Smith and Lily Evans. They giggled as much as he had under the influence of the potion, and gave him a birthday kiss and a very pretty parcel with a violet bow, containing Honeydukes sugar quills.

He didn’t feel quite as euphoric the next morning, but that was only to be expected.

He’s soon going to be seventeen, and he’s filled with trepidation as his birthday approaches. That’s perfectly normal. He’s always queasy on the run-up to a new year, and it has nothing to do with intuition or foresight: he feels just as bad before the brilliant birthdays.

This year, though, he has every reason to believe it’s going to be a horrible day. For a start, ever since the Prank a few months ago he and Sirius haven’t really been talking, not properly. A birthday that includes a silent, subdued Sirius isn’t destined to be fun exactly. He’ll be coming of age, and probably Sirius won’t even notice or get him a present or smile or pat him on the shoulder, or kiss him, the way he did once or twice before that dreadful night.

It’s raining when he wakes up, the sort of steady, dripping rain that isn’t going to stop in a hurry. That’s a bad thing. On the other hand, there are lots of parcels at the end of his bed, which must be a good thing, if you don’t count the time James and Sirius wrapped up a nest of Flobberworms for him. But that was an April Fool, not a birthday present.

Sirius is already up, lurking, the way he’s been doing for a while. He smiles tentatively and says, ‘Happy Birthday, Moony.’

Remus keeps his voice neutral. ‘Thank you.’

There’s a huge thump, and James lands beside him, almost breaking the already creaky bedsprings. ‘Happy Birthday, Moony! Wait’ll you see what I got you… The big parcel, over here, look.’

Peter roused by the noise, joins the others on Remus’s bed, rubbing his eyes. He always looks a bit grumpy on birthdays.

There’s a blur of paper and presents. James’s parcel is a box of Muggle tricks called _The Little Magician._ ‘They’re amazing,’ James raves. ‘You need to use your wand, of course, and you can do all sorts of things.’

Sirius grabs it and tears open the cellophane wrapping, without even asking. Remus smiles. Why, it’s almost like the old days.

Peter has got Remus a box of chocolates; Sirius, as expected, hasn’t given him anything. Well, he says ‘I have your present here, Moony,’ and dangles a mysterious roll of parchment in front of him, holding it just out of reach. To emphasise the point, he adds ‘Later,’ so it’s either a joke, or he’s just messing about, as usual.

For once, Remus’s birthday is absolutely ordinary. It’s the usual Thursday: Divination, Care of Magical Creatures, Transfiguration. At tea, the Gryffindors sing ‘Happy Birthday’ and he blows out seventeen candles on the cake his mother sent, and then cuts a piece for everyone in the common room.

The rain hasn’t stopped all day, and after tea it’s already getting dark. Remus starts his Divination essay, chats to James about Quidditch, and eats mashed potato for dinner. He’s decided to become a vegetarian, even though James laughs at the thought of a werewolf not eating meat.

Later, he dozes by the fire in the common room: he’s leaving the rest of his homework, just for this one day. There’s obviously not going to be a surprise party this year. He isn’t too disappointed; he won’t mind waking tomorrow with a clear head, and it will make a change to have such a thoroughly uneventful day. Perhaps all his cells have changed now, and he’ll be a different person, and his birthdays in future will be pleasant and forgettable…

‘Moony.’ Sirius is pulling at the sleeve of his robes. ‘Moony, you have to come upstairs.’

Roused from his daydream, Remus is a bit disoriented. ‘What?’

‘It’s Prongs. He’s fainted. You must help me.’

Remus, shaken, follows Sirius: he wants to hurtle up the stairs to the dorm, but somehow his legs feel filled with lead. Damn. It’s going to be a bad one; he knew it all along. James is going to die, and somehow it’ll all be his fault, and he’ll never be able to celebrate his birthday again. This dreadful thing will hang over him for the rest of his life, and he’ll have to leave school and live in the woods by himself… He pushes open the door, already crying out, ‘Prongs!’ then stops dead, his heart suddenly beating at about three times its normal rate.

‘Sirius, what the hell --?’

The dorm is dark and deserted. Sirius mutters something, and the lock slides to.

‘Shh. Remus. No talking.’

Sirius’s arms are round him, and his lips are on his. It’s been five months since that first, furtive kiss behind the greenhouses last autumn, and almost five months since that last, only slightly more confident one, also behind the greenhouses. Strange how in the interim, without kissing or touching or even looking at each other, they seem to have become so much more experienced. Maybe it’s because they’ve both been missing each other so much that this feels like coming home again. And what could be more right or comforting than that?

Time stands still. Remus doesn’t have a clue what day or year or even century it is. He doesn’t remember it’s his birthday. He doesn’t know or care about anything except that he and Sirius have somehow managed to shed all their clothes, and are lying on his bed, and the world is exploding in a blur of sensation that blots out everything else.

After a while, Sirius lights his wand, retrieves his robes from the floor and fishes out the mysterious parchment, which is rather crumpled. He looks a bit sheepish; apologetic even. ‘I hope…I hope that was okay. We, well, I, persuaded Prongs that it would be better than a party if we could have some time together. To make up. I didn’t really think we’d go quite this far.’

He hands Remus the parchment. ‘Don’t say anything.’

_Dear Remus,_

_I’m sorry. I really am. I love you, and I hope you’ll have a brilliant birthday.’_

Remus reads and rereads the note over and over again, until Sirius is almost palpably tense beside him. ‘Moony? Have I messed everything up again?’

Unable to speak, Remus shakes his head.

‘I got you a real present as well. The new Captain Hawkins book you’ve been talking about. It’s in my bedside table. I wanted you to have a good birthday. It was all right, wasn’t it?’

The best yet, Remus thinks, but all he can do is turn to Sirius and smile, rather shakily. Sirius then hugs him so tightly he can hardly breathe, and they proceed to make the best birthday yet even better. 

**2\. Peter**

Peter’s birthday always gets a bit neglected. He doesn’t know why: it seems mean, really.

Oh, the Marauders aren’t going to forget a birthday completely – or they haven’t yet – but somehow none of them puts quite as much care into Peter’s presents as they do into, say, Sirius’s. Remus is already fretting about what to buy Sirius, even though his birthday isn’t for ages, and goes on and on about it, whenever Sirius isn’t in the room. ‘Prongs, Wormtail, help. I’ve just got this catalogue from ConjureArgos, and they have wonderful laser disc players. Listen: _‘Won’t be available in the Muggle world for ten years.’_ He’d love one. You know how he’s always getting Lily to sing for him.’

James says, ‘Moony, have you seen the price of one of those things?’

Remus looks, and his face falls. ‘Oh. I didn’t think.’

James pats him on the back. ‘Never mind. Perhaps if we all club together…’

But Remus won’t. He wants his presents to Sirius to be special, just from him.

Sometimes, Peter suspects that the others don’t even get him last minute presents, but recycle unwanted presents of their own. For instance, James gave him a Snitch last year: valuable and amazing, on the face of it, but when he actually weighed it in his hand he found it was made of some cheap Muggle material and didn’t fly, or even bounce. In fact, it looked suspiciously as if James had simply charmed some very fragile wings on to his old, broken Remembrall.

Sirius is always good with presents, but even his gifts to Peter don’t quite have the calibre of the presents he gives the other two. The David Bowie poster was great, and, Sirius assured him, a genuine Muggle bargain, but it doesn’t actually _do_ anything, just hangs there. Sirius gave James an all-singing, all-dancing Queen poster, which is a bit annoying when it bursts into _Bohemian Rhapsody_ in the middle of the night. 

For a week before Peter’s seventeenth birthday, he waits for one of his friends to mention it, just to show that this year they’ve remembered in plenty of time. He refuses to remind them. In his more optimistic moments, he likes to think that they’re plotting something special, like the time Sirius thought they’d forgotten his fifteenth birthday, when all along Remus and James were planning the party to end all parties: which it pretty well did, when McGonagall found most of the Gryffindors passed out in the common room the next morning amidst the empty bottles. 

And that wasn’t even a milestone birthday. Seventeen is special. Seventeen means you’re an adult. Surely his fellow Marauders are going to make his day one to remember?

By the time his birthday comes, none of the others have even mentioned it. The day dawns with some promise, though. He goes, as usual, to wake Remus, who tends to oversleep; and Remus is the one most likely to remember, or to feel guilty about forgetting it when Peter casually reminds them what day it is.

Remus’s bed is empty. Peter’s heart leaps: an empty bed means that Remus is probably down in the common room, perhaps arranging presents, ready for the moment when he emerges from the dorm, so he’ll get a big surprise.

He goes to see if Sirius is awake yet, and finds his bed empty too. Excellent. That means at least one vaguely decent present.

James is still snoring: well, it isn’t quite seven. Peter returns to bed, pleased to see a parcel waiting at the foot; from his mother, of course. His mother isn’t awfully good on presents either, and it’s probably a scarf, as usual, though sometimes she branches out into other clothing. But it’s the thought that counts, as she always says.

He decides to wait to open it till he’s seen what the others are planning down in the common room, and snuggles back in his bed for a bit of a lie-in.

The door of the dorm clicks, and there’s scuffling and giggling. Peter lies still, pretending to be asleep. He’s glad he’s left a gap in his curtains, so he can open his eyes just a fraction and see what’s going on.

Remus and Sirius are tiptoeing across the room, trying to be quiet. They’re not carrying parcels: well, the parcels are downstairs, aren’t they? Any second now, they’ll come and wake him.

Sirius reaches out and takes Remus in his arms, and starts – smooching him is the expression that comes to mind. Peter is confused. He knows they like each other, but then, all the Marauders like each other. It must be a birthday joke.

Remus pushes him away. ‘Shut it, Sirius, you’ll wake them. And Peter’s curtains aren’t properly closed… Oh, shit.’

Peter peeps again, and sees Remus looking, with an expression of great dismay, at the parcel. There’s some scuffling and more whispering, and Remus’s trunk creaks open. He and Sirius disappear behind Remus’s curtains, and Peter can hear a muttered spell, before they emerge, carrying a large, beribboned package. They’re neither of them good at wrapping charms, which are for girls anyway, and even through half-closed eyes Peter can see that they haven’t succeeded in matching all the wrapping paper, so the bottom of the parcel is green, the top pink with flowers, and the sides lurid orange. The blue bow is good, though: Remus is talented at tying spells.

James emerges from behind his curtains, grumbling, ‘For goodness’ sake, you guys, can’t anyone get any sleep round here?’

Remus and Sirius immediately shush him, and all three of them crowd on to James’s bed. James’s ‘Bloody hell!’ is perfectly audible, however, and though Peter doesn’t hear his trunk opening, he can hear the thud of the lid as James carelessly lets it drop, and the ‘Ouch!’ of whoever got his hand caught.

About five minutes later, they troop over to Peter, singing ‘Happy Birthday.’ Remus holds out the garish parcel. ‘It’s a joint present. From me and Padfoot.’

Peter opens it, trying to believe that his friends thought about this and planned it. He finds a big box containing two and a half bars of Honeydukes caramel chocolate, Remus’s favourite. ‘Sorry one of them got started,’ Remus apologises. ‘Sirius wanted to make sure it was nice and fresh for you.’

Sirius pouts, and Peter notices that Remus can’t help smiling indulgently at him. 

‘Happy Birthday, Wormtail.’ James hands over a largish rectangular package, quite neatly wrapped but without a bow. It contains a bar of soap, a rather nice quill – James eyes that wistfully as Peter takes it out – and a small box of Zonko’s itching powder. ‘You’re not to use that on us,’ Sirius says. Peter is sure it’s the itching powder James bought a month ago, when he and Sirius were particularly pissed off with Snivellus, and then didn’t open because McGonagall threatened them with expulsion over the vanishing ink prank. Yes, it has that little dent on the corner. James wanted to change it, but it was the last box in the shop.

‘So,’ Remus says, with an attempt at joviality, ‘what’s your Mum sent you, then?’

Peter opens his last parcel. It isn’t a scarf this year, but a new set of dress robes. 

‘Let’s see,’ James says. Peter shakes them out and holds them up. They’re the same shade of lurid orange as the wrapping paper on the sides of the chocolate parcel. Remus and Sirius smile politely: everyone knows they both have a weird aversion to dress robes.

‘Well. Happy seventeenth, Wormtail,’ says Sirius. ‘You’re an adult now. You can do all the things we can.’ He gives Remus an extraordinarily lascivious look. ‘Right. Let’s get dressed and go down to breakfast.’ 

**3\. James**

James is a conventional sort, at heart, and his birthdays follow a conventional pattern. No matter what day they fall on, his parents will come to Hogwarts after school to see him and take him out. His first year at Hogwarts, his birthday was on a Saturday, and Sirius was invited to join him to see the Montrose Magpies play Puddlemere United. On subsequent birthdays, all his friends have taken part in whatever treat's been planned for him. They’ve accompanied James and his parents to the Muggle cinema, ice-skating, and even to a party at MagicDonald’s, where James was presented with a colouring book and crayons, and Peter was sick after drinking seven strawberry milkshakes. 

On his seventeenth birthday, his parents are going to take him and the other Marauders out to dinner in Hogsmeade. It’s supposed to be an adult occasion, to mark James’s coming of age, and James has been nervous about it ever since it was first mooted. 

‘You and Moony won’t start messing about, will you?’ he asks Sirius.

‘Yeah, we’ll have it off on the table. For goodness’ sake, Prongs, what d’you think we are? Can you imagine Moony coming out to your parents?’

‘I can imagine _you,_ ’ James mutters darkly.

‘Well, don’t. I was eating at fancy restaurants while you were still throwing mashed banana from your highchair,’ Sirius reminds him.

‘I hate bananas,’ James retorts.

His birthday starts promisingly, as they always do. His parents have sent a very elaborate watch for him to open in the morning, which shows the time all over the world, the date, the weather, and provides a news update. Today’s hot item is that the Kenmare Kestrels have spectacularly won this year’s League Cup.

Sirius gives him a year’s subscription to _Playwizard_ – ‘Keep you going till Evans comes across, mate’ – and Remus, who has apparently consulted with him, gives him a year’s subscription to _Quidditch Weekly._ Peter has obviously not been included in the sending of forms and Galleons to Wizard Magazines Unlimited, and has bought a new chess set. He’s bought James a new chess set every other birthday since Second Year. 

The lessons are easy and there’s birthday cake for tea.

James is allowed to meet his parents in Hogsmeade this year, instead of having to wait for them to fetch him from the school. He and his friends set out just as the others are flocking to dinner in the Great Hall.

His parents are waiting outside the _Wand and Casserole_ , the best restaurant in the village. His mother is carrying a bag full of presents – he always does get spoiled, although he’s already got his big present, the watch – and his father beams and gives him a one-armed hug. ‘Happy birthday, darling,’ his mother squeals, dropping the bag in her excitement at seeing him, and kissing him enthusiastically.

James used to be wildly embarrassed by his mother, but now he knows more about Sirius’s psychotic mother, Remus’s silly one, and Peter’s neglectful one, he doesn’t find her so bad.

The restaurant is dimly lit, with flickering lamps on the tables, pink cloths, and massive silver cutlery: James is relieved that the story about werewolves and silver is only a myth. 

His father orders wine – ‘You boys are old enough to have a glass on special occasions.’ James tries not to smile as he thinks about the many times he and Sirius have sneaked out to the Three Broomsticks and persuaded Rosmerta to serve them something stronger than Butterbeer.

They eat giant prawns that look good and taste a bit woolly. His mother does something furtive with her wand, and they improve a hundredfold. He notices that, in spite of all his warnings and Sirius’s reassurances, Sirius and Remus are sitting really far too close. They probably don’t notice themselves, because it’s habit, but he knows his parents will. He frowns at Sirius slightly, to warn him to move away a bit; Sirius glances back, not understanding.

He kicks him under the table. Sirius instinctively glances at Remus, rather to James’s amusement; slightly grim amusement.

‘So, Remus, how are you enjoying Defence this year?’ James's father asks. ‘Have you done the Unforgivables yet?’

‘Only Imperius. But next term, we’re going to learn Cruciatus.’

‘Not to use, I hope!’ James's father chuckles at his joke; it isn’t really a joke, not this year, but Remus laughs too. 

‘I could happily Crucio some of those Slytherins,’ James says. ‘Snivellus, for a start.’

‘That poor child!’ his mother protests. ‘I knew his mother at Hogwarts. Eileen Prince. She married this dreadful man, absolutely dreadful. He drinks. I believe he beats the boy.’

‘He’s hardly a child,’ Sirius says. ‘And it serves him right if his father beats him. I don’t blame him.’

‘Really, Sirius!’ James's mother is distressed. 

The second course arrives. Remus’s aubergine parmigiana looks rather more appetising than the islands of grey meat on the other plates.

‘This place has definitely gone down,’ James's father says. It’s his turn to flick his wand, and transform the meals into something a bit more edible.

Sirius steals a forkful of Remus’s food. ‘Mm, that’s good, Moony.’

‘There’s grated cheese in it.’ They gaze at each other, smiling shyly and rather sweetly, momentarily oblivious to the place and the occasion.

‘Guys…’ James groans. His mother is eyeing Remus and Sirius speculatively, and he can just imagine what she’ll be asking him after dinner, before his parents Disapparate home.

A group of wizards are being seated at the table next to them, arguing about who’s going to take the chairs with their back to the room. As James’s parents watch the rather heated debacle, Remus takes the opportunity to run his fingers through Sirius’s hair. He really doesn’t need to: it’s as immaculate as ever, unlike his, James thinks ruefully, smoothing it back reflexively. He really hopes his mother hasn’t noticed. She’d think it was rather unhygienic, for a start, fiddling with hair at the dinner table.

James's mother prods nervously at her potatoes. The charm bounced off them, and they’re rather underdone. She starts to talk in great detail about their holiday last year. ‘The French resorts are getting very overcrowded. You’d think every wizard in Britain was there last August! Of course, the swimming is good… And James enjoys the French Quidditch, don’t you, darling?’ She beams at him.

‘Talking of Quidditch…’ James launches into a blow-by-blow account of the last match. He’s trying to distract his father from Remus and Sirius, who are now practically sitting on each other’s laps, talking in low tones, completely ignoring the rest of the guests, and eating Remus’s parmigiana from the same plate. At least they’re not sharing the fork…oh, wait, they are. Shit.

Because he’s already had cake at school, he’s spared the agony of having the waiters parade in with a candlelit extravaganza. Instead, they order ice cream and coffee. ‘The ice cream here used to be good,’ his father says. ‘Home made.’ It still is, and there’s no need for wands to be whipped out hastily to improve it.

James scowls at Remus and Sirius, kicking Sirius hard again to emphasise that there’s to be no tasting of different flavours or licking each other’s spoons, or each other. 

Sirius grins at him, open and happy, enjoying the evening and the company. James can’t help grinning back, and for a wonderful moment they’re Potter and Black, James and Sirius, Padfoot and Prongs; partners in crime, brothers and packmates. It’s an intense, almost intimate moment. There are six years of shared experience and expertise in that exchange, six years of pranks and laughter and affection. 

‘Having a good birthday, Prongs?’ He sounds genuinely concerned, and James remembers that whatever the new pairings are, or may be in future, Sirius will always be his best friend: it’s as simple as that.

He thinks for a moment. On the minus side, he’s no nearer winning the heart of Lily Evans, two of his mates are practically announcing to the whole world that they’re sleeping together, and his mother is now embarrassing him by singing ‘Happy Birthday’ softly to her ice cream.

On the plus side, he’s with five of the six people he loves most on earth, and that can’t be bad, no matter how much he’s going to kill Remus and Sirius when they get back. 

‘Yeah,’ he says, trying to sound non-committal, because he is, after all, a seventeen year-old boy, and the cool leader of his gang. ‘It’s okay.’

**4\. Sirius**

Nobody forgets Sirius’s birthday. Even though he’s nearly eighteen he still gets excited about it, and he still finds it impossible to hide his excitement. Last year, he was the first to come of age, and that was unbearable enough, as he lorded it over the others, talking about the many privileges of turning seventeen. ‘Magic out of school! Hey, Prongs, I’ll be able to hex the Slytherins all I like.’

This year, as he’s found in Muggle Studies, he’s going to be of age in the non-magical world.

‘Just think, Moony, I’ll be able to vote.’

‘Don’t be silly, Padfoot. Wizards aren’t registered to vote, are they?’ Remus always pays attention in Muggle Studies.

‘I can be. If I want to.’ Sirius’s grey eyes are wide with wonder at the many things he’ll be able to do in the Muggle world, such as drinking in seedy London clubs. 

Remus is the most indulgent of the Marauders, especially where Sirius is concerned, so he puts up with his increasingly wild ramblings. ‘I can be a landowner,’ Sirius prattles, as if he won’t already get Grimmauld Place someday, whether he wants it or not. ‘I can get married.’

James snorts coffee out of his nose at that. ‘You could get married when you were sixteen, Padfoot! And we haven’t noticed you rushing to the altar.’

As the day gets nearer, and Sirius gets more and more hyper, Remus gets more and more nervous. Sirius is the sort of person who finds out where his presents are hidden and peaks under the wrapping to see what he’s getting. Remus wants to surprise him, and also worries that his surprise won’t be good enough.

James is fed up with both of them. ‘Thank goodness you only have one birthday a year, Padfoot,’ he grumbles. ‘We’d all go crazy if we had to do this more often. Actually, I think Moony _has_ gone crazy.’

‘I _haven’t_ ,’ Remus says. ‘I just don’t want Sirius poking about my trunk again.’

Sirius is, in fact, determined to make inroads into the strange no-man’s-land under Remus’s bed, littered with dust, chocolate wrappers, and books still open at the page where Remus stopped reading. But he squeezes Remus's hand and says, ‘I promise, Moony. Remus. I solemnly swear that I won’t try to find out what you’ve got me.’

‘I want an Unbreakable Vow.’ Remus scowls.

‘That is one.’ Sirius crosses his fingers, so it won’t count.

The final days pass, as days do, and soon it’s six o’clock on a chilly November morning and Remus has crept into Sirius’s bed to give him his first birthday present while James and Peter are still asleep. Sirius is overexcited and forgets to cast a Privacy Spell, so they manage to wake the other two bright and early as well. Peter is so embarrassed that he can’t remember where he hid his present – ‘On top of your canopy’ Sirius tells him helpfully, and Accio’s it for him – and James, for some reason even he can’t fathom, finds it hilarious, and gets a fit of the giggles that persists most of the morning.

‘I don’t see what’s so funny,’ Sirius says. ‘Doesn’t Lily ever make a noise then? Because if she doesn’t, you’re probably doing something wrong.’

Remus performs a series of complicated wand movements to get his parcel from what must be halfway up the chimney. Sirius is impressed. ‘I never thought of that! I knew I loved you for more than just your body, Moony!’ He gives Remus a big kiss that starts to turn lingering. Peter makes a truly horrible choking noise.

‘You won’t like it,’ Remus says, suddenly downcast. ‘Perhaps I’ll take it back. Change it. Yes, I’ll just pop down to the Owlery – ’ 

‘No, you won’t,’ Sirius says, and threatens to kiss him again, but James clears his throat and reminds them that it’ll soon be breakfast time and there are presents to open.

Sirius tears off wrapping eagerly, ignoring carefully written labels and ornamental bows. ‘A Potion Maker’s kit! Just what I wanted!’

‘I thought we could try that levitating one,’ James says, his eyes gleaming behind his glasses.

‘Brilliant! Thanks, Prongs.’ He leans over and gives James a kiss on the cheek. James goes scarlet. ‘It’s okay, I’m not going to jump you. Though you’re one fanciable guy…’

‘Shut _up,_ Padfoot. You’re upsetting Moony. No, no, don’t start. Just open your presents.’

Peter has used half a sheet of wrapping paper and what looks like a whole roll of Spellotape to create an impenetrable parcel. Sirius starts to tear at it, but it won’t budge. 

‘You need your wand,’ says Peter smugly. ‘I didn’t want you to find it this year.’

‘I knew where it was all along, Wormtail!’

‘Yeah, but you don’t know what’s in it, do you?’

Eventually, Sirius manages to get enough of the wrapping off to reveal a very flat package labelled ‘Tablet.’ He looks confused. ‘Is that sort of like a solid potion? We did something in Muggle Studies.’

‘Aspirin,’ says Remus helpfully. ‘Or paracetamol even.’

Peter looks smug. ‘I ordered it all the way from Edinburgh. It’s a Scottish sort of fudge. That Muggles eat.’

Sirius is impressed. ‘Thanks, Wormtail. I’ll take it to show Professor Carter.’

Remus looks as if he’s about to burst into tears. Sirius is sure that if he weren’t holding the final present tucked firmly beneath his arm, Remus would have wrested it away and sent it halfway round the world by now. 

He takes his time with it, preparing his face to show pleasure and approval, no matter what it is. Last year, Remus gave him some very useful Tarot cards that analysed their own meanings, a gift which earned him the highest mark in Divination ever recorded at Hogwarts. His first spread featured The Fool, who opened his mouth and informed Sirius, ‘You are about to do something incredibly stupid.’ The Prank ensued: if the fallout hadn’t been so traumatic, Sirius would have been impressed by the accuracy of the prediction. 

Divination, Potions, Muggle Studies… He thinks idly that it’s interesting how many of his presents have to do with lessons, as if he were some sort of academic or something. Oh, he likes them. He _loves_ them. But he’d like something more frivolous too, like a, a…rectangular sort of box with a screen, where tiny moving figures dance and play. Remus fiddles with a knob, and a squeaky voice says, ‘Your wife is having an affair with the house-elf!’ Music swells and words fill the screen.

‘What is it, Moony?’

‘Soap opera. Sorry, the wizarding channel’s rubbish in the mornings. All the witches watch it then.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Sirius taps the little box with his wand, and a Quidditch team appears on the screen; the Wimbourne Wasps, from the look of the yellow and black striped robes.

Remus is pale with anxiety. ‘It’s…well, my uncle helped develop the prototype, and he got a big discount for me on this one. I thought we could share it, though, if that’s okay.’

They’ve already agreed that Remus will come and live in Sirius’s flat after school. Sirius is relieved, because this is obviously a major and expensive present, even if Remus’s uncle did get it cheaply. ‘Are there people inside it?’

Remus is shaky on the technology. ‘I think so. They, they shrink them, and then they talk to anyone who’s watching.’

‘What else can they do?’

‘There’s cookery.’ The two of them squint at a very fat lady beaming as she trails her wand round a big cake, making curlicues of butter icing. 

‘Wow.’ Sirius could watch the little box all morning, but James and Peter are getting impatient for their breakfast; besides, he’s hungry too.

He doesn’t care that the other two can see them: not that he ever does. He gives Remus a big hug, and a kiss, and whispers, ‘I’ll thank you properly later.’

Peter turns away, disgusted.

James rolls his eyes. ‘Now we’ve got that sorted out, let’s go downstairs, shall we?’ he says, taking charge, as always. ‘Oh, and Happy Birthday, Padfoot.’

**5\. Last but not least…**

Sirius and Remus sit glued to the little box. They’ve now found a children’s programme featuring brightly coloured insects singing alphabet songs, and Sirius is chanting, 

_‘A is for apple, all shiny and red,  
But if you don’t wash it you may end up dead.’_

‘A is for _Avada Kedavra,’_ James says pointedly.

Remus swishes his wand, and a strange woman appears, sitting in front of an object not unlike the little box they’re watching. She’s tapping at some sort of keyboard, as words scroll across the screen. _‘Happy Birthday for August 10, emeraldgreen! Hope it’s a good one.’_ She sees them watching her, and waves wildly.

‘I think she’s trying to tell us something,’ Sirius says.

‘August?’ Remus is confused. ‘Last time I looked it was November.’ 

‘That’s because you haven’t taken your eyes off that damn thing for years,’ James says. ‘You’ve managed to miss two wars, for a start.’ 

‘Who’s Emerald Green anyway?’ Sirius asks, and James smirks.

‘Lovely girl,’ he says. ‘Got red hair, like Lily.’

**End**


End file.
